Aerial work platforms are often utilized to enable a person to access areas high above reach to install fixtures, perform maintenance, or the like. Unlike a ladder, which must lean against a solid object or have a second set of supports to be free standing, an aerial work platform is self contained, mobile, stable, and provides a large platform surface upon which the user can work. The disadvantages of most aerial work platforms are their physical size both when collapsed and extended and the mount of energy required to activate their extending means to raise the platform to the desired height.
The aerial work platform of the present invention has many features and accomplishes many objectives which overcome these disadvantages and distinguish it from the prior art. First, the present invention is an aerial work platform of the single scissors type. My aerial work platform utilizes only one set of scissor type structures or beams for lifting purposes. This greatly reduces the overall width of the aerial work platform and allows its use in areas where it was previously impossible to locate an aerial work platform because of space limitations. Likewise, its structure is lighter and more compact than traditional two scissors type aerial work platforms.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an aerial work platform that requires only one extending means, typically a hydraulic cylinder. Furthermore, because of the unique and novel positioning of the extending means, the amount of work required by said extending means is greatly reduced.
Typically, at least one end of the extending means of single scissors prior art aerial work platforms is connected to the aerial work platform's base structure. My aerial work platform's extending means, typically a hydraulic cylinder, is connected between the first pair of scissors mechanism and the third pair of scissor mechanism using offset mounting assemblies. Due to the resulting mechanical advantage derived from the position of each end of the extending means on each mounting assembly, a smaller and more efficient hydraulic cylinder and hydraulic oil pump for raising the work platform are utilized by my invention.
A further object of my invention is to reduce the side bending forces and connecting pin loading of the aerial work platform. The present invention utilizes an additional support member or beam which is attached substantially or somewhat parallel to its extending means to reduce the side bending in the single scissor mechanisms and to reduce the connecting pin loading caused by the hydraulic cylinder loading.